Hot and Steamy

You remember how I couldn’t stop looking at the kitchen sink after I installed it? How I kept going back and back every 5 minutes and gazing admiringly at it? Well I am doing it again. Only this time it’s the upstairs bathroom.

When you finally finish a project you cant help but keep reminding yourself that it is over, and that you no longer have to sweat blood and lay awake at night worrying about it. It’s like you have to keep checking that it really is done.

The bathroom is done. The. Bathroom. Is. Done. THE BATHROOM IS DONE. Happy dance!

Last time I wrote about the bathroom as a whole (as opposed to just the vanity cabinet) I had just finished laying the marble tile, and had reinstalled the toilet.

Originally there had been a plastic skirting board that ran around the base of the bathroom wall.

Mmmm … plastic edging. Tasteful. Not.

I enjoyed pulling that out, sooooo much. And throwing it the trash even more. This left me with a rather ugly gap between the wall tile and the floor tile.

A rather ugly gap. Better cover it up.

Taking my cue from the light and vanity industrial/steam punk vibe, I decided to cover this gap with aluminium flashing. I measured it out.

Measuring up

Cut it, then glued it to the wall using construction adhesive.

Done!

That’s better!

And then I re-installed the steam punked vanity:

Installing the upcycled vanity

After that things got really exciting. I was on a roll with the whole industrial steam punk idea, and began tinkering around making things in the studio. Some things were made from scratch and others involved reworking existing objects.

While doing so, I kept thinking about what furniture maker and interior designer Charles de Lisle said in a recent report in Dwell magazine. He suggested that creating interesting rooms isn’t just about going for a certain style, or buying the right stuff, it is about being playful, and trying things out until you find what works.

He said: “It’s not about specific objects; it’s about the process – adding and subtracting things and experimenting with crazy ideas … I look at how pieces talk together and create a narrative. There has to be a story.” (‘Furniture Counsel’ Dwell, Vol 12, No.7, June 2012 p. 52).

The idea of creating a narrative or story in a room, one that emerges by being open to possibilities and ideas, however wild they might seem at the time, has some resonance for me with the upstairs bathroom makeover. I didn’t start out on this bathroom journey thinking that I would work with an industrial or steam punk theme; back when this whole thing started the wildest thing I was planning was to paint the walls a glossy loud pink.

In the beginning there were pink walls to come

But as the bathroom evolved, and different problems cropped up and had to be resolved, this is exactly what emerged. The upcycle of the vanity light:

led to the steam punking of the vanity:

Which in turn suggested other things for the room. Things like: a planter to sit on the toilet tank (created from a Home Depot wooden window box):

Bathroom planter filled with pink calla lilies (and yes they are real). I wanted some plants to soften the room a little.

And some wall boxes for storage (made out of Ikea wooden boxes):

Steam-punked Ikea boxes became wall shelves

And an industrial style towel rail (made from scratch by me):

My industrial style towel rail

And a hand towel rail (which is actually an Ikea curtain hanger):

Ikea curtain hanger repurposed as a hand towel rail

Rather than bombard you with images of how I made these things, I will deal with each of them separately in posts to come. They all came about from being open and flexible, going with the flow, and taking the ideas where they will.

Which is a pretty unconventional way of approaching interior design. And impossible to do if you are working with contractors: the only reason I could do it this way, was because I was doing it myself.

Now, the moment you have all been waiting for. Now it is time for the big bathroom reveal. I have dropped in a few befores, just to remind us of where it all started.